Jolene (2008)

I'm talking about the movie Jolene (2008), not the song by Dolly Parton. It's directed by Dan Ireland...I know he's done other movies with central female characters, probably most notably The Whole Wide World (1996) with Renee Zellweger.

The movie is about an orphan named Jolene who looks for love in all the wrong places and goes through 10 years of roaming the country. It starts with her getting married at the age of 16, in order to escape the foster care system. Reality she finds is quite grim, when she gets involved with her husband's uncle, ending with consequences that land her in a juvenile loony bin. Needless to say, she gets out of that one with a lesbian affair to top it all off. Then, she flees to Arizona, eventually winds up in Las Vegas, then in Tulsa and eventually in Los Angeles. I'm not going to focus so much on the intricacies of what happened, in case you haven't seen the movie.

And honestly I can't even say whether I liked or disliked the movie. I know what the director was trying to do by showing the way some foster children turn out, but also showing a disadvantaged woman who thinks that objectifying herself will somehow be an ends to her means. However, Jolene seemed to have a very long learning curve and didn't seem to learn her lesson after the first, second, third time, etc. I guess that some people don't learn that easily, but I really felt that Jolene *always* left herself vulnerable, alone and with nothing. That's why I'm not sure if I enjoyed the movie because it makes a good point of how screwed up a person in the system can become, but I think that we should have seen a lot more personal growth for Jolene, especially after 10 years. At least the very end leaves us with a glimmer of hope.

The movie wasn't boring and moved at a good pace, but I was annoyed by how the movie portrayed a domestic violence shelter that Jolene went to. It made it seem as though the staff were completely unattached, unaware and uncaring. That is personally offensive to me because I worked at a DV shelter and I know that the movie portrayal was no where close to the truth.

Either way, you should check out the movie whether you like the song Jolene, by Dolly Parton (yes, the character has red hair), or if you like movies featuring central female characters. Jessica Chastain played Jolene and she was very good in the role; she really carried the movie. Also, I like Michael Vartan and he always plays good guys. This is a good chance to catch him playing an eccentric bad guy. Good stuff!

Well, enjoy and take care. Peace!